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A military revolution… or just another boondoggle for the beltway bandits? Lasers for shooting down mortars bombs and missiles… sounds great and has potential to change battlefield quite fundamentally… if it actually works in practice out in the messy real world. Remember Patriot? Much cheered at the time but it turned out to be a wildly expensive but only occasionally effective weapon system designed to shoot down rather cheap and only occasionally effective Scuds.
I suppose it all comes down to it is this another a vastly costly to operate system designed to shoot down various cheap-as-chips weapon systems? I suppose time will tell because potentially this is revolutionary as battlefield lasers could eventually mean the end of a great many forms of indirect weapons. Potentially.
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Considering all the money that has been put into directed energy weapons research since Reagan’s 1983 ‘star wars’ speech its not surprising that the effort is beginning to pay off.
Please note that this seems to be a solid state laser, not a chemical one. There is also a laser equipped C-130 that is in the works and of course the ABL 747 that is supposed to shoot down a ‘scud type target’ next year.
Gunpowder was first used as a weapon in Europe in big things like cannons. Then they got smaller and smaller, until we had revolvers for the average person. I wonder how long it will take for lasers to become personal weapons? I’d sure like a Blaster!
It’s worth noting that while the Patriot missile system didn’t work very well in the first gulf war, incremental improvements and upgrades to both the software and hardware have made it a much more capable platform today. The PAC-3 version performed very well during OIF, and is easily at least as good now as it was originally supposed to be back in 1991.
Remember Patriot? Much cheered at the time but it turned out to be a wildly expensive but only occasionally effective weapon system designed to shoot down rather cheap and only occasionally effective Scuds.
If memory serves, the Patriot was originally designed to intercept planes. Then it was tweaked to handle much faster-moving missiles — an example of continuing technological evolution. And the subsequent generation of anti-missile missile is becoming quite good, if we are to believe the press releases.
The Fatman atomic bomb used at Nagasaki weighed tons. Within a decade, the US had a nuclear demolition charge which a marine could carry in a backpack.
Twenty years ago, mobile phones were the size of a briefcase — and expensive.
The list is endless. Technology improves, as long as there is a clear goal and a paying customer. No reason to assume that directed energy weapons will be any different.
The real question is — once directed energy weapons have been perfected, will any of the political class in the technologically advanced world have the courage to use them?
I seem to recall that the SM-3 missile that we vaporized USA-193 with was able to continuously update its course so as to hit a specific point on that satellite.
This is one way to shorten the feed-back loop between targeting system and target: put the targeting system on the warhead.
But each shot of a laser hits its target as quickly as optical and radar signals return from it. Its difficult to overstate just what a dramatic advantage this near-instantaneous feedback gives such a weapon.
For that reason alone I think this is a worthwhile objective of weapons research.
The munitions it intercepts may themselves be cheap, but the damage they would cause if allowed to land is not. In this age of the West not really having the stomach for war, even a handful of extra casualties could even lose us the entire conflict.
What’s more, lasers would be cheaper over their lives than Patriot. Each Patriot missile cost hundreds of thousands to millions to manufacture, and was expended once used. A laser, on the other hand, would only require maintenance and electrical power.
The latter ingredient is the main problem – supplying enough electricity fast enough.
Attention might be given to the “intelligence” of Chinese development of (Russian Design & Build) missile destroyer weaponry for Aircraft Carrier destruction. Similarly to become available to their expanding Sub fleets.
The torpedo tubes are largely gone from the destroyers. Subs have submerged launch capabilities.
Response to those changes, plus getting ahead of the curve, is probably urgent for the continuing effect of what has amounted to “containment,” (even if not stated).
The U.S Carrier fleets (basically “gun platforms” of older parlence) are in urgent need of build out and replacements. The associated battle group ships have been advanced, but are not in great supply, nor are facilities for construction.
Weaponry for disruption of coordinates guidance systems probably show the most immediate promise, though interception holds sway by tradition.
We won’t have to go to the next one, they will deliver it.
The mortar systems may be “cheap as chips”, but the Jihadis expend a lot of organizational capital getting that $50 mortar shell on a US base. Mortar teams get shredded by Apaches all the time. Moving and storing mortar tubes is dangerous for the bad guys as well, since discovery can mean instant death-by-smartbomb.
If we can shoot down, say, 75% of the incoming shells it quadruples the organizational “cost per shell”. That may be enough to dissuade this kind of attack. Jihadis want to die for Allah, but they don’t want to die uselessly for Allah.
I think, though, putting far less money put into extra counterbattery capability would be just as effective on a conventional battlefield.
I’ll second the comments that while Patriot had, in retrospective analysis, a rather poor record in 1991 the evolution of the Patriot system has been fantastic, and the current incarnation absolutely lives up to the original hype of the system in 1991.
I must correct MDC’s comments about laser power sources. No modern laser suitable for the battlefield is electrically powered, THEL, MTHEL, and ABL are all chemical lasers. (M)THEL uses a Deuterium Fluoride fuel, a quantity of which is expended for each firing of the laser. Future battlefield laser systems may use electrical power, but we are a far way from that reality.
Actually there are solid state lasers being tested. You are right that the chemical lasers are a current front runner for the really high power systems.
When they field this new weapon, the early incarnation will liikely be as Perry expects. Expensive, difficult to use, full of problems in battlefield use and with a not so great effectiveness.
Inside of 10 years, with real experience under their belts, this will be very different.
In 20 years no one will understand how anyone ever thought it wouldn’t work.
In 50 years, they will change warfare so drastically that it is hard to explain. I believe I wrote an article on this about 5 years or more ago. We may be back to the age of fortresses, on the ground, in the air, on the water and in space slugging it out with lasers taking the place of the cannon and cannonball.
Agree except for the time line, Dale. It will be the next big war that does all those things. How long would it have taken to have radar, jet engines, and nuclear weapons/power without WWII? One year of wartime is probably about the equal of ten years of peacetime in the technology race.
Alices’s memory is wrong. The Patriot was originally an IRBM anti-missile system, but ran afoul of the ABM ICBM Treaty as the “squishys” feared the Soviets would take offense–so it’s software was intentionally dumbed down to make it fit for only aircraft. Problem was, the Army didn’t want an anti-aircraft weapon-only system at that cost. Dan Quayle alone, as a Freshman Representative, single-handedly saved the program via his unstinting efforts, and got them to improve the soft-ware just enough to be viable–but not too viable–to satisfy the squishys and yet field an effective but less than perfect weapon system.(Half a loaf, etc.) One could make the argument that Dan Quayle alone prevented nuclear war in the Middle-East, as many hold that Israel would have used nuclear weapons absent the Patriot.
Good point, virgil. Most people think of Dan Quayle (if they remember him at all) only as a dunce who couldn’t even spell “potato”. The fact is, he was highly regarded in Congress for his knowledge of military affairs (which is why he was nominated for VP). Isn’t it funny how only the Republicans get tarred like that?